European Digital Innovation Hubs mainly reach larger, faster‑growing and high‑tech firms, risking reinforcement of existing digital divides; policymakers should revise outreach and selection to better include less digitally mature SMEs.

Which firms receive digital innovation support? Evidence from the European Digital Innovation Hubs network

Elodie Carpentier, Diego D’Adda, Daniel Nepelski · August 29, 2026 · International Small Business Journal Researching Entrepreneurship

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EDIHs disproportionately serve larger, faster‑growing, and more high‑tech/knowledge‑intensive firms, indicating they reach more digitally mature and innovative firms while potentially underserving less advanced SMEs.

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Governments have increasingly prioritised business support services and innovation intermediaries to stimulate economic growth, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises. This article examines which firms access services from publicly funded digital innovation intermediaries, using data from European digital innovation hubs (EDIHs), to compare approximately 15,600 customer firms against the broader European business population across demographics, performance, capital structure and innovativeness. We find that EDIH customers tend to be larger, faster-growing and more active in high-tech, knowledge-intensive and ICT sectors, suggesting stronger pre-existing digital capabilities. These findings indicate that, while EDIHs support innovative and digitally mature firms, less advanced firms may be systematically underserved. Policymakers designing innovation intermediary initiatives should carefully consider the selection mechanisms that shape targeting, to ensure these programmes effectively reach their intended beneficiaries.

Summary

Main Finding

Publicly funded digital innovation hubs (EDIHs) disproportionately serve firms that are larger, faster-growing, and already active in high‑tech, knowledge‑intensive, and ICT sectors. This pattern implies that EDIHs tend to reach more digitally mature and innovative firms, while less advanced firms may be systematically underserved.

Key Points

Sample: ~15,600 customer firms of European digital innovation hubs (EDIHs).
Compared EDIH customers to the broader European business population across firm demographics, performance, capital structure, and measures of innovativeness.
EDIH customers are, on average:
- Larger (employment/size),
- Faster growing (sales or employment growth),
- More concentrated in high‑tech, knowledge‑intensive, and ICT sectors.
These characteristics suggest stronger pre‑existing digital capabilities among customers.
Potential selection effect: the current design or outreach of EDIHs may favour firms that are already relatively advanced, rather than those most in need of digital capacity building.

Data & Methods

Data source: administrative/registry records of firms served by European digital innovation hubs (EDIHs), aggregated to about 15,600 customer firms.
Comparison group: the broader European business population (industry and country coverage implied).
Outcomes compared: firm demographics (size, sector), performance (growth), capital structure, and measures of innovativeness/digital activity.
Analysis approach: cross‑sectional comparisons between EDIH customers and the broader population to identify systematic differences in characteristics.
Limitations (as implied by the study): observational design cannot fully disentangle selection into EDIH support from causal impacts; details on matching, controls, and causal identification are not provided in the summary.

Implications for AI Economics

Targeting and diffusion of AI/digital technologies:
- If intermediaries mainly serve already digitally capable firms, public programs may reinforce uneven AI adoption and widen firm‑level digital divides.
- Policies aiming to broaden AI diffusion should explicitly address selection mechanisms that favour advanced firms.
Policy design recommendations:
- Introduce selection criteria, outreach, and incentives that prioritize or reserve capacity for less digitally advanced SMEs.
- Offer tiered services: foundational digital/AI readiness programs for lagging firms and advanced innovation support for mature adopters.
- Monitor participant characteristics and set coverage targets to ensure intended beneficiary reach.
Evaluation and research directions:
- Use causal evaluation (e.g., randomized outreach, quasi‑experimental methods, or propensity score matching) to measure program effects and understand who benefits.
- Study complementarities between intermediaries and other instruments (grants, training, finance) to design packages that enable lower‑capability firms to adopt AI.
- Quantify longer‑run spillovers (regional productivity, employment composition) from serving advanced versus less advanced firms to inform cost‑benefit tradeoffs.
Equity and growth tradeoffs:
- Policymakers should balance short‑term productivity gains from supporting advanced firms against long‑term goals of inclusive digital transformation and diffusion of AI across the firm distribution.

Assessment

Paper Typedescriptive Evidence Strengthmedium — The analysis uses a large administrative sample (≈15,600 customer firms), which supports precise descriptive comparisons about who EDIHs serve, but it is observational and cross‑sectional, so it cannot disentangle selection into EDIH support from causal program effects or dynamics over time. Methods Rigormedium — Rigor is bolstered by administrative data and a large sample size, but the summary indicates only cross‑sectional comparisons without clear use of matching, controls, or quasi‑experimental techniques; key methodological details (time frame, covariate adjustment, weighting, handling of sector/country composition) are missing. SampleAdministrative/registry records of roughly 15,600 firms that were customers of European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIHs), compared to the broader European business population (industry and country coverage implied but not fully specified); outcomes examined include firm size (employment), sales/employment growth, sector (high‑tech/ICT/knowledge‑intensive), capital structure, and measures of innovativeness/digital activity. Time period and exact country/industry coverage are not specified in the summary. Themesadoption innovation IdentificationCross‑sectional descriptive comparisons using administrative/registry records for ~15,600 firms that received services from European Digital Innovation Hubs (EDIHs) versus the broader European business population; no randomized assignment or quasi‑experimental design reported and no causal identification strategy is implemented. GeneralizabilityLimited to firms that engaged with EDIHs — does not represent all SMEs or non‑participating firms (selection into program)., Findings are Europe‑focused and may not generalize to non‑European institutional or market contexts., Sectoral overrepresentation (high‑tech/ICT) means results may not apply to low‑tech or traditional industries., Cross‑sectional snapshot; patterns may change over time as EDIH outreach or program design evolves., Heterogeneity across EDIHs and countries (program design, resources) may limit transferability of aggregated findings.

Claims (5)

Claim	Direction	Outcome	Confidence & Evidence	Details
EDIH customer firms are, on average, larger than firms in the broader European business population. Firm Productivity	positive	Firm size measured by employment or related size indicators.	Reading fidelity high Study strength medium	n=15600 0.18
EDIH customer firms grow faster than firms in the broader European business population. Firm Productivity	positive	Firm sales growth or employment growth.	Reading fidelity high Study strength medium	n=15600 0.18
EDIH customers are disproportionately concentrated in high-tech, knowledge-intensive, and ICT sectors relative to the broader European business population. Adoption Rate	positive	Firm sector membership and concentration in high-tech, knowledge-intensive, and ICT industries.	Reading fidelity high Study strength medium	n=15600 0.18
EDIH customers appear to have stronger pre-existing digital capabilities and innovativeness than firms in the broader European business population. Adoption Rate	positive	Measures of firm innovativeness, digital activity, and pre-existing digital capability.	Reading fidelity medium Study strength low	n=15600 0.05
EDIHs may systematically underserve less digitally advanced firms because their current design or outreach tends to favor firms that are already relatively advanced. Adoption Rate	negative	Access to or participation in EDIH support across firms with different levels of digital maturity.	Reading fidelity high Study strength low	n=15600 0.09